THX receiver

I have been interested in home theater for a long time now and have finally decided to step up to the plate. I'm hoping that some of you fine folks can give me recommendations on a THX certified receiver that has all of the dolby settings as well. thanks.

Supporter

I too would recomend the Pioneer Elite in the THX certified recievers. For non THX recievers I would recomend Yamaha. I realize that you said your budget was 1k. What power or watts per channel where you looking for and what features where you looking for? May I recomend that you concider a price ceiling of $1,500.

The prices are from web sites so the ones that do not have a price are ones I could not look up. But I am sure they make models in the price range you are looking at. I personally own a Yamaha RX-V995 reciever that sounds very good and has been a very nice HT piece. Personally I do not like Sony ES recievers for myself. But Sony ES may be an option for you? Some people like Sony ES recievers and others have ended up replacing it with something else. Pioneer Elite has video upconversion on its models and the MCACC feature that is very nice. Anyway I hope this helps.

While there may be several non-THX-certified receivers that perform quite well, purchasing a THX-certified receiver guarantees a minimum level of performance. With so many companies out there playing the "specs" game with their power ratings, it's nice to know that at least some system of standardized performance exists for those who want it.
Firstly, a receiver must meet strict performance requirements in order to achieve THX certification. It must provide suitable levels of power to fill either a normal room (THX Select) or a larger room (THX Ultra) with "reference level" home theater sound. Each channel must meet minimum output requirements. Further, the reciever must also be capable of low-impedance, high-current amplification.
Secondly, THX receivers also employ several processing features, including re-equalization to reduce the treble in movie soundtracks, decorrelation to add a sense of "stereo" to the monophonic signal of the rear surrounds, timbre matching to balance the quality of sound from the front and rear speakers, and --lastly -- strict specifications for subwoofer output. Many of these features are not used on many non-THX-certified receivers.
So, while a THX-certified receiver may not necessarily be superior to a particular non-THX-certified receiver, at least you can be assured that the THX-certified receiver will meet minimum technical requirements to deliver quality home theater sound. With the non-THX-certified receiver, you may not know for certain until you buy it and install it.

thanks for all the help guys, this is a lot of great information....I may raise my price ceiling and have also now been giving some consideration to the pre/pro setup, but none the less all of you have been a great help and I look forward to anymore information you may have to give me.

I agree 100% with Darryl. I recently purchased my receiver on the same grounds as to what he just stated. I chose the Denon 4802 which I was able to pick up for $1600. Had it of been full price, I would have had to get something lower end. I initialyl looked at the Denon 3802 (although not THX certified) and the Sony 4ES. I found the Yamaha's a bit too bright sounding for me as my receiver is used for 80% movies and 20% music. I personally would recommend staying away from the Kenwood line. Although they offer 7.1 channels, it comes out of the box with 5.1 with a seperate amp needed for the 2 rear channels. It wasn't the easiest task to find a THX certified receiver in the $1000 range that I liked as the selection was pretty thin.

Supporter

I would agree with Darryl also but I have not been impressed with the Kenwood Sovereign line up of recievers. IMHO I would pick something else besides Kenwood. Even back when Kenwood started offering THX recievers and had the touring semi truck. There set up was set up on the hot side and they used hidden external amps to make the reciever sound great.

I am of the opinion that THX can all but be totally ignored. First, it seems not to be a stamp of quality anymore. Cheesier receivers are more frequently pandering only for the THX logo, and sure, they can put out some power, but they smack of the same cheapness and crummy sound as they always have. The ONLY thing that thx gets you that is useful is re-eq, which is a moot point now because almost all receivers now have that anyway, for those that even know/bother with it.

I'm with Dave to stay away from the kenwoods. A friend has the 6070, it's THX certified, and it wouldn't stand up next to a Marantz sr5300 (non-thx) any day of the week. The power supply lookst about the same in the Kenwood, if not smaller, and it does not sound nearly as good. I say ignore totally the THX logo. What does it mean? It means that out of that x amount of money, a large chunk is going just for a little paint on the front that says THX, that could otherwise have been spent on a better receiver...

Tomlinson Holman and the engineers at THX have forgotten more about home theater than I'll ever know, so I personally respect the research and development behind the specifications and requirements. I also appreciate the value of these minimum performance requirements to serve as a benchmark for home theater performance in an industry that provides very few objective performance evaluations for these products. Besides, few of us have access to every receiver that we would like to consider and audition -- much less access to receivers that are in the same listening room with the same speakers and setup.
While they are not necessarily the "end all, be all" of home theater performance, THX standards are quite comprehensive and many manufacturers employ them. THX produces performance standards for film transfers to video, speakers, amplifiers, DVD players, and so on. THX also co-developed Dolby Digital EX processing. While you may choose to ignore the validity of THX certification for receivers, you are pretty much stuck with it above a certain price range with many manufacturers, including B&K, Kenwood, Pioneer, Denon, Onkyo, Marantz, and so on. Their upper echelon receivers will have THX certifications, like it or not.

greetings,
i feel that AMMON's choice of the denon 4802 for the price was a great one. i have the 5800 and was reading reviews of the new 5803. one reviewer stated purchasing a 4802 at about $2000 less than a 5803 was a great value as the differences were essentially in the power area but all the essential toys were there, so if ou can modify your budget i think the 4802 would be a great choice.